Past year: ▲ 68%(65.0c – 1.20 CAD)
Each one in plain English, with the numbers worked through for a shareholder.
15 Dec 2022listing compliance notice▼ BadMajor
Peru's securities regulator approved the voluntary removal of the shares from the Lima Stock Exchange effective 15 December 2022, leaving the Toronto listing. A retreat from the market of the country that hosts Yauricocha, taken while the company was in a strategic review and facing the Kolpa approach.
14 Nov 2022material agreement● NeutralMajor
Kolpa and Arias Resource Capital pressed their proposal in further correspondence. The board's answer is to fold them into the wider strategic review run by CIBC Capital Markets rather than negotiate bilaterally, and to invite other interested parties to bid - the standard defence when a 27% shareholder is also the suitor.
31 Oct 2022material agreement● NeutralMajor
Received an unsolicited, non-binding letter of intent from Peru's Compania Minera Kolpa proposing a merger with a concurrent financing, submitted together with Arias Resource Capital Fund II, which the letter says already holds about 27% of Sierra's shares. A special committee of independent directors, formed as part of the strategic review that followed the Yauricocha shutdown, is considering it - so the company's largest shareholder is on the buyer's side of the table.
18 Oct 2022other material event▼ BadMajor
The turn from an operating problem to a solvency one: a special committee of independent directors was formed to consider financing and restructuring alternatives because the company faces liquidity problems from the Yauricocha suspension plus accumulated operating losses and negative cash flow at Bolivar and Cusi. Most of Yauricocha remains shut with no timeline, and the company warns that without additional funding its ability to operate in the ordinary course may be affected - a year after paying its first dividend.
28 Sept 2022production update▼ BadMajor
Reached agreement with the Alis residents and began a measured, progressive restart at Yauricocha, but the company states it cannot say when pre-suspension output will be reached and keeps production and financial guidance withdrawn.
22 Sept 2022production update▼ BadMajor
Residents of the nearby town of Alis blockaded the access road to Yauricocha, keeping production suspended beyond the safety shutdown, with only critical maintenance running. A community dispute now sits on top of the fatal accident.
12 Sept 2022production update▼ BadMajor
A mudslide underground at Yauricocha on 11 September 2022 killed three contractor employees and injured one. Mining was suspended pending an investigation by the Peruvian authorities. Yauricocha is the company's largest and most profitable mine, and this is the event from which everything that follows runs.
29 Apr 2022drilling result▲ GoodMajor
Eight holes from the 720 level found the Fortuna zone next to existing Yauricocha workings, with 27.22% zinc over 4.90 metres and 12.94% zinc over 2.85 metres in ECF 10 22 02, and 6.41% copper with 3.51% zinc over 4.80 metres in ECF 10 22 05; true widths are not yet determined. It is the last exploration success reported before the mine's September 2022 collapse.
4 Mar 2022resource reserve update● Neutral
Filed the updated Yauricocha expansion report with no material differences from the January announcement.
3 Mar 2022resource reserve update● Neutral
The updated Yauricocha study as filed, effective 31 March 2021 and dated 25 February 2022, prepared by SRK Consulting (Canada) with Redco Global Peru responsible for reserves and mining.
20 Jan 2022resource reserve update● NeutralMajor
Reworked the Yauricocha expansion case on the March 2021 resource and with prefeasibility-level cost estimates: after-tax net present value of US$273.1 million at 8%, down from the US$359 million filed in December 2020, on US$102.2 million of development capital in the first three years, US$312.1 million of total capital and an operating cost of US$44.01 a tonne. Better costings made the same project worth less, and the mine plan now leans on inferred resources.
5 Nov 2021dividend declaration▲ Good
Declared an annual dividend of US$0.03 a share on 163,428,150 shares, about US$4.9 million, payable 7 December 2021. It would prove to be the high point: within a year the company was in a strategic review after a mine collapse.
29 Sept 2021resource reserve update● Neutral
Filed the updated Bolivar study including iron ore, with no material differences from the August announcement. Its effective date is still 31 December 2019, so the resource base behind the US$361 million figure is nearly two years old.
29 Sept 2021resource reserve update● Neutral
The updated Bolivar study as filed - the October 2020 report reissued on 21 September 2021 with iron ore production added, still effective 31 December 2019.
16 Aug 2021resource reserve update▲ GoodMajor
Reworked the 10,000 tonne-a-day Bolivar study to include iron ore concentrate as a saleable product, lifting the after-tax net present value from US$283 million to US$361 million at 8%. The incremental value of going from 5,000 to 10,000 tonnes a day rises from US$57.4 million to US$78.2 million, so most of the improvement comes from selling the magnetite rather than from the extra throughput.
21 Apr 2021material agreement▲ GoodMajor
Board approved US$28 million to build a magnetite plant at Bolivar, with US$5.2 million released immediately for early procurement, to produce about 500,000 tonnes a year of 62% iron ore fines as a by-product of the existing copper concentrator. Construction was to start in June and take roughly six months - the first hard capital commitment behind any of the expansion studies.
13 Apr 2021drilling result▲ Good
Found a new high-grade oxide zone along the Yauricocha fault between the Cachi Cachi and Esperanza areas, inside the existing mine footprint. The intercepts are narrow but exceptionally rich: 29.05% zinc over 1.0 metre in hole 17-21-13, 28.64% zinc over 2.0 metres in 17-21-03, and 571 g/t silver with 22.58% lead over 0.9 metres in 17-21-01. Oxide material is a different processing problem from the sulphides the mill was built for.
6 Jan 2021resource reserve update● Neutral
Filed the technical report for the 2,400 tonne-a-day Cusi expansion study, unchanged from the December announcement at an after-tax net present value of US$81 million.
6 Jan 2021resource reserve update● Neutral
The Cusi expansion study as filed, effective 31 August 2020 and dated 13 November 2020, prepared by SRK Consulting (Canada).
22 Dec 2020resource reserve update● Neutral
The Cusi resource report as filed, prepared by SRK Consulting (Canada), effective 31 August 2020 and dated 13 November 2020.
22 Dec 2020resource reserve update▲ Good
Filed the Cusi resource report, effective 31 August 2020: measured and indicated up 18% to 5,356,000 tonnes from 4,557,000, reflecting the new high-grade vein system found during 2020 development.
10 Dec 2020resource reserve update▲ GoodMajor
The third expansion study of the season, doubling Cusi to 2,400 tonnes a day for an after-tax net present value of US$81 million at 8%, assuming US$20 an ounce silver long term, and US$134 million of net after-tax cash flow. The step from 1,200 to 2,400 tonnes contributes US$28.1 million of that at a 46.8% return.
8 Dec 2020resource reserve update● Neutral
The Yauricocha expansion study as filed, effective 30 June 2020 and dated 19 November 2020, prepared by SRK Consulting (Canada).
8 Dec 2020resource reserve update▲ GoodMajor
Filing the Yauricocha report improved the headline: the after-tax net present value in the final document is US$359 million, 7.8% above the US$333 million announced three weeks earlier. Unusually for these filings, the report does differ from the press release, and in the company's favour.
18 Nov 2020resource reserve update▲ GoodMajor
Yauricocha's measured and indicated resource tonnage rose 26% and inferred 79%, to 16 million and 12 million tonnes - the largest in the mine's history and, as management notes, achieved after mining 9.1 million tonnes since the 2011 acquisition, when indicated resources were 5 million tonnes. The accompanying study puts an after-tax net present value of US$333 million at 8% on expanding from the permitted 3,150 tonnes a day to 5,500, having tested cases up to 7,500 and settled on 5,500 as the optimum for the resource base.
6 Nov 2020resource reserve update● Neutral
The Bolivar expansion study as filed, effective 31 December 2019 and dated 19 October 2020, prepared by SRK Consulting (Canada) with Sierra's own VP Corporate Planning as one of the qualified persons.
5 Nov 2020resource reserve update● Neutral
Filed the technical report for the 10,000 tonne-a-day Bolivar study, with no material differences from the October announcement.
20 Oct 2020resource reserve update▲ GoodMajor
A fresh Bolivar study, this time for 10,000 tonnes a day rather than the 5,000 assumed two years earlier: after-tax net present value of US$283 million at 8%, US$521 million of net cash flow, US$317 million of life-of-mine and sustaining capital and an operating cost of US$19.77 a tonne. The incremental step from 5,000 to 10,000 tonnes is worth only US$57.4 million of that at a 27.9% return, so most of the value is in the first doubling, not the second.
28 July 2020production update▲ GoodMajor
Restarted Cusi after the COVID-19 shutdown, with testing and quarantine protocols, aiming to ramp to 1,200 tonnes a day by year end - the rate the 2018 expansion study assumed. New chief executive Luis Marchese cites a better silver price and the new high-grade zone, and expects silver to become a meaningful part of the revenue mix again.
18 June 2020drilling result▲ GoodMajor
A genuinely high-grade silver find at Cusi in a northeast-southwest epithermal vein system: 17.45 metres true width at 428 g/t silver, plus 4.90 metres at 1,140 g/t, 9.35 metres at 304 g/t and 8.75 metres at 303 g/t. It builds on the 40-metre stockwork announced in June 2018 and, like that, matters because width allows bulk mining at a mine that has struggled with narrow veins.
